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a b s t r a c tThe interaction between local foragers and incoming farmers is one of the hot topics in the study of Europe's recent prehistory. In Central and Western Europe's loam region, occupied by the first farmers of the Linearbandkeramik (LBK), hunter-gatherer remains are scarce and consist mostly of surface finds. Hence, the hunter-gatherer occupation and activity on the loess has never been studied in detail. This paper tackles the problem of the visibility of hunter-gatherer activity on the loess belt. An interregional comparison of microlith datasets allows identifying behavioural changes and differences in exploitation intensity. With regard to forager-farmer interaction, a mutual influence in the spatial patterning of activity or settlement is demonstrated.Ó 2008 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.The loess belt during the Early Holocene: unoccupied land?The interaction between local foragers and incoming farmers is one of the hot topics in the study of Europe's recent prehistory. It is closely related to the debate on the Neolithic spread over the continent. Traditional models of demic diffusion, in which agriculture was introduced in large parts of Europe by rapid movement of farmer communities, have been put in perspective by the acknowledgement of the complexity of the Mesolithic-Neolithic transition. Rather than a single process, this transition can be viewed as a mosaic of regionally varying and complex interactions between hunter-gatherers and immigrant farmers (e.g.

This chapter focuses on the neolithization process in two different landscape zones of the Scheldt basin extending over western Belgium: first, the northern coversand lowland bordering the Atlantic coast; and second, the southern loess area of Middle Belgium. Although the neolithization of both areas seems to have had a different course, there is evidence of continuous and increasing contact and interaction between population groups occupying each region. In the loess hill land, neolithization can be distinguished in two phases, separated by an archaeological hiatus of several centuries. The first phase is related to the arrival of the Linearbandkeramik (LBK) and the Groupe de Blicquy (BQY), while the second is connected with the Michelsberg culture (MK) occupation of the area. Unfortunately, it is difficult to determine the place of local hunter-gatherers in this process. In the sandy lowland, on the other hand, Mesolithic hunter-gatherers culturally belonging to the Swifterbant culture seem to have survived much longer, probably until the end of the fifth millennium cal bc.

IntroductionThe past decade of research on the Mesolithic/Neolithic transition in Europe has shown this transition to have been a 'mosaic' of processes and interactions rather than a single and clear-cut transition process (e.g. Tringham 2000). It varies greatly in different parts of Europe with regard to its timing, contact situations and the transition processes at work. A leading thread is the local impact of the Neolithic and the archaeological result entailing the end of traditional hunter-gatherer communities. This is the case all over Europe, including Scandinavia, the British Isles and Ireland (Fig. 1). Apparently, the advent of the Neolithic signified the start of a new way of life, no matter what transitional processes or temporal delays involved.The loess belt of the Low Countries forms a remarkable exception. It is the westernmost region settled by Linearbandkeramik (LBK) communities and their cousins of the Groupe de Blicquy (BQY) during the late 6 th and early 5 th millennium calBC. With the sudden disappearance of these communities, however, the Neolithic as a whole seems to have vanished as well. The region was not occupied by Hinkelstein/ Grossgartach and Roessen, the post-LBK Danubian cultures that can be found to the east and south, nor by a local Neolithic similar to the Cerny in Northern France. Only during the last centuries of the 5 th millennium calBC, at the beginning of the 'Michelsberg Culture phase', does the Neolithic take up its thread (Fig. 1).The existence of such hiatus is of importance for understanding the regional transition process, and implicitly also for understanding the relationship between local hunter-gatherers and the incoming Neolithic in general. This paper focuses on the gap and the explanation of its existence. After presenting the archaeological cultural sequence in the region, the relationship of the Neolithic with local non-Neolithic communities is explored. This is done by analysing the indications of contact on the one hand and the nature of the Neolithic compared to the local Mesolithic on the other. ABSTRACT -This paper deals with the chronological hiatus in the Neolithic 106The Neolithisation process in the southern part of the Low CountriesThe local Mesolithic during the late 6 th millennium calBC remains poorly understood. This is due to a general decrease in the number of sites and to problems with the taphonomy and post-depositional formation of the archaeological record. In the Low Countries, many Mesolithic sites are known as surface sites from the coversand region in Northern Belgium and the Netherlands. These sites are often palimpsests and even if they are excavated, their absolute dating is confronted with major problems. Bad or doubtful spatial associations between dated samples and archaeological assemblages, dislocation of artefacts and samples caused by bioturbation, and problems related to the nature of samples are frequently mentioned obstructing factors (see Crombé 1999;Schild 1998; Vermeersch 2006). Crombé et al. (1999) claim that dates o...

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